When Bill McShane, Nick Colby and Eric Melin were K-State students in the 90’s they spent their days working at Subway and the local record store, and their nights rocking out in church basements and bars.
The three made up Ultimate Fakebook, the second band in Manhattan signed to a major record label, which was Noisome Records out of Lawrence. The band went on to travel all over the country, play major venues, and tour with impressive bands like Fall Out Boy. This year they’ll return to Manhattan for MidFest, and celebrate the release of their latest album the Preserving Machine which just so happens to focus heavily on the energy and nostalgia of the town they started in, and what it was like to be young with a dream.
“Manhattan, Kansas is always our home,” said Eric Melin, drummer for Ultimate Fakebook. “When you look back on that time period, we were all in our early 20’s and just working shitty jobs. I would ride my bike to go meet them at Subway and they would hook me up with a Subway sandwich for lunch and we’d sit there and conspire and talk about the new songs we were writing and who we were sending press kits out to and who we could convince to become our booking agent, and what shows we had coming up.”
The boys had a hustle in them like no other. Not without cause, of course. Their performances drew in hundreds of kids in Manhattan looking for music and a space to rock out. It seemed what they had to offer was in high demand, and the group was always working to create more of a music scene in Manhattan.
The band eventually connected with booking agent Trish Bauer who initially didn’t have room for the group, but the boys said they were happy simply being on the road, and she agreed. The group jumped in a van and traveled almost a year and a half straight touring their music.
“It was risky,” said Melin. “We had day jobs when we left and then when our jobs couldn’t support us anymore we had to quit and we had to try to stay on the road and make our money that way. Sometimes we’d come home with a little cash and sometimes we’d come home and be like we gotta get out again”
The unpredictable nature of the road seemed to help the band thrive. Not to mention, tour life had some perks too. Melin said that the band had never had as tight of a live act as they did when they were gigging every night.
“We didn’t even practice,” he said. “We didn’t need to practice. We would sound check new stuff and then work it up and practice it on the road.”
The band’s time on the road was a formative, gritty, adventurous one that they all look back on fondly now. The band’s singer and guitarist Bill McShane was reminiscing on the “Manhattan Days” and felt inspired to write an EP for the group to enjoy for themselves. Once he got to writing, however, the idea felt too good for a simple EP.
“I was like these are great, these are too good to be some silly little EP,” said Melin. “Lets actually fill this up, do you have any other songs? Then he started working on some other songs, and if you look at the record it’s ten songs, half of them are about Manhattan and half are about whats happening now.”
That album is the Preserving Machine. The one they’ll finally get to celebrate the release of at MidFest on Saturday, July 23 at the Hat. It’s called the Preserving Machine because of the influences it takes from the past while still innovating a new sound in many ways.
“The record is called the Preserving Machine because there’s a short story called the Preserving Machine by Phillip K. Dick who’s an old sci-fi writer. It’s essentially about how music has to change, it can’t stay preserved… music will constantly evolve and turn into something new and surprising.”